School was targeted by scammers in fraud bid
THERE was an attempt to scam a school in Rhondda Cynon Taf out of money by using a fake email address this year.
The attempt was made from what looked like a school email address, requesting a change to the school bank account details in a process which is known as “mandate fraud.”
A report which came before the council’s audit committee on Monday, November 5 revealed the corporate fraud team had stopped an attempt to defraud a school of its funds recently.
The controls the council has in place over changes to its bank details prevented money from being intercepted.
There was also a similar attempt made at a school in a neighbouring authority in the same period.
From April to October this year, there have been 352 referrals to the council’s corprorate fraud team.
The vast majority, 332 are related to the revenues and benefits system.
These referrals are received from a number of sources including employees, members of the public, external agencies such as HMRC or the DWP, through the online fraud facility, the council’s whistleblowing facility or a telephone or letter directly to the team who thenb decides whether
Ian Traylor, the council’s head of pensions, payroll and payments, told councillors that the email address used for the attempted fraud in RCT was almost identical to a school address but was missing one letter.
He said: “That is how clever some of this fraud activity can be. It is a case of raising awareness.”
“We are clear in terms of our zero tolerance approach.
“If we are able to take legal action and it warrants that then that is what we will pursue.
“We take attempts very seriously as well.”
He also mentioned a case where an application for a regeneration and planning grant of £37,000 was withdrawn by a company after concerns were raised over its authenticity.
Other examples include the failure to disclose information about a resident who was getting a council tax exemption with discounts of nearly £1900 being recovered and a salon owner and her employee falsely applying for parking permits by claiming the salon is where they live and the permits were immediately revoked.